Wednesday's Child (Paperback)

In precee this all seems rather grim. In actual fact, Wednesday's Child is a very gentle and frequently humourous tale. It is a book where, though the events themselves are cataclysmic, characterisation always takes precidence over plot: Millar seems more concerned with creating a birds-eye view of one family than anything else. And she does this well: by the end of the book I regarded Aunty Net, Nan B and even Dick Roberts with (an albeit slightly annoyed) affection - much the same way as they regarded each other - and the different members of the family came to seem disarmingly life-like (oddly enough even when, perceived as they are through the eyes of an over-imaginative 8-year-old, they frequently exhibit larger-than-life characteristics). The dialogue between them is sometimes brilliantly conceived - and is, in itself, is a neat little trick, as it's presence allows Janet to retain her child-like naivety whilst enabling the reader to 'read between the lines' and decypher what is actually going on in the adult world, as such. The best thing about Wednesday's Child, however, is it's enduring optomism: in a world which is often brutal, and in the face of enormous opposition, Janet somehow manages not only to survive but remain bright-eyed and bushy tailed until the very end. Ultimately then, it is a tale about redemption, peopled with characters who have learned the hard way to laugh in the face of disaster.

In short, I thoroughly enjoyed Wednesday's Child. It may not be epic, but on it's own small scale and in it's ambition to take a closer, sensitive look at the life of one family dealing with poverty, abuse and the rigours of growing up on a council estate, it is a very accomplished debut.

The important thing is that it works so well from a child's perspective. There's no heavy introspection or leaden analysis of the situations, but adult readers know all too well the problems that the children face. They can also enjoy the good humour and imagination with which they face them.

The book is often sad - but it's never too heavy,and it's as funny as it is moving. The writing's crisp and clear, the voices are all real and the characters full of life.

It's full of pain, but a pleasure to read.

However, pretty much everything else about the novel is poor. The story or plot is virtually none-existent, events take place: the murder, the stories of ghosts, the flashbacks to the other family, the hospitalisation of the mother, James running away, the police catching James stealing - but none of it is properly linked together. One could easily rearrange the timeline and the story would be almost completely unaffected.

It is not mandatory for characters to be likeable in order to enjoy reading about them, but in this work they are all so pathetic and unfathomable that it is hard to identify with any of them, at any level. The father beats the children, but it is unclear why. He is angry but no real explanation or exploration is given to the anger, it simply exists. I know lots of people that have worked in factories, the very factory he works within in fact, but it is not a job alone that makes someone angry.

Most fathers work, most fathers are tired - but this doesn't explain why someone sinks to physically abusing their children. Factory work more typically can hollow out a person if they feel they were destined for more; but no such characteristics or intensions are hinted at in the father - he merely works as a cut-out character marked 'bad guy'. His anger diminishes when the mother becomes ill (cancer I suspect, but again no explanation is given), but we don't really know why, they don't seem to have any affection for each other, now, or previously.

All of the characters are stunted in this way, they are shallow and motiveless. The result is that one cannot feel sympathy for any of the characters; they simply go through the motions of domestic deprivation. The reader is never enlightened as to why or how they got there, so why should the reader care?

Poverty can be grinding in the inner city, but it is not always so; much greater factors play out within the human condition to create misery other than a lack of money. It is patronising and misplaced to state that being working class naturally results in child abuse - it is an insult to the millions of people that do work in factories but produce happy family units. Most people work long hours to support their children and hope to give them a better life. It is undeniable that the type of family portrayed by Millar does exist, but it is wrong to explain it using 'working in a factory' as an explanation.

The murders within the novel seem to be little more than a half-hearted plot device, left abandoned when it failed to inject any cohesion to the plot and the characters ambling around it. If indeed the murder is allegorical, what does it mean? Considering this is Millar's first novel I would advice her to master the basics before dabbling with hidden messages. Don't try to be literary as a substitute for writing fiction that follows the fundamental rules of good writing. Like any form of art, one must prove oneself to be capable of crafting work that adheres to the classical rules before abandoning fundamentals such as premise, motivation, or conclusion. Experimental literature is the liberty of those whose proven reputation already sells and has an audience. Without a name, such work will be largely regarded as pretentious and ill-devised, as it should be.

The novel does contain the essence of a good story and Millar has a fine voice. A better editor may have suggested the following.
The book would have worked better if it were to explain the existing abusive circumstances as a consequence of events preceding the present day. Millar could then have used a history of the parents' relationship to explain their deterioration and present state. Show them as young and single, finding happiness in their union. Build the story up to show how the disappointment of low wage income life combined with unfulfilled aspirations ignites previously unseen anger in the father, and bitterness in the mother.
Detail how they decided to have children in an attempt to re-establish their dwindling love.
Create motivation in the father for the abuse of the children - he is jealous of his daughter's intelligence and inventiveness, and hateful of the love the mother has for them, but not him. Show how he blames his family - including his mother and father - for holding him back and crushing his dreams.
That would allow the reader to identify and sympathise with the characters as they would be witnessed in a happy and optimistic state, slowly transforming into the wrecks presented in the present.
The story then could show how the fathers spiralling frustration and anger concerning his life drives the son away, and causes the mothers health to fail her. Then, at the crucial point introduce hope in the story by making the father address his sins and the causes of his anger - find the psychological explanation for his violent folly.

The book would be worth reading if it explored how emotional poverty leads to reoccurring abuse, and also how material poverty is actually an irrelevancy to compassion.